Random Ramblings #5

Hmm... I think I feel something... What could it be? Oh right! THE RANDOM RAMBLINGS ARE BACK! Brace yourselves folks. This one could get messy.

Iran Bans Female LoL Champs

Where to begin with this one? It was revealed on Reddit earlier this week that the Iranian branch of the World Cyber Games have banned almost all female champions in the upcoming League of Legends tournament, with Annie being the only exception. There is a small caveat with Annie though, the volume of the headphones must be lowered.

What?! So as Redditor Paydrum explains, these decisions have been made to comply with laws enforced by the Ministry of Ershad. In order to obtain the permits to run the tournament, the organisers made the changes to "jump through their hoops". Regardless of the fact that this has to be one of stupidest rules I've seen in my time of following E-sports, they have even banned Anivia a character who is a giant blue bird. I can understand the more scantily clad women in LoL being banned to comply with the social and political setting of the region, but a bird who happens to have a female voice?

Boy Shoots Grandmother: "Video Game to Blame"

On to something equally as depressing, an 8 year old boy in Louisiana shot and killed his grandmother. Immediately the news was broken that police had found that the child was playing Grand Theft Auto IV prior to the shooting, leading the media to blame the game for the violent act.

Let's look at this objectively though. The boy was left under his grandmothers care, had access to both a game CLEARLY aimed at adults and a loaded firearm. Who is to blame here? Video games or poor parenting? I personally am sick of the media trying to find any way to blame anyone other than parents for a child's actions. If those parents had of taken a slight interest in their child, he would not have been playing the game for starters (as that game is definitely not the sort of thing a child should be playing), and he would have been educated about firearms or even better, not had access to the loaded weapon in the first place. This was clearly not a video game causing a tragic act, this was poor parenting.

And that concludes this edition of the Random Ramblings. Sorry for it being both short and mildly depressing.

As always folks,

GAME ON!

Hearthstone Beta

So unless you live under a rock or somewhere equally without internet (in which case how are you reading this, you wizard?), you probably know about Hearthstone, Blizzards new completely virtual card game. It was released in closed beta two weeks ago to widespread fanfare and excitement virtually everywhere. Fast forward to today, when a tweet from Blizzard says that the opt-in wave of Beta keys has finished.

I am one of the people who has been looking forward to Hearthstone since the announcement of it. The beta release hyped me a little more than it should have, as I tend to not get overly hyped about betas of games. If I get into a beta, then I play it, but certainly don't make it all I play. However, looking at the thread on the Hearthstone sub-reddit, you would think that Blizzard has killed someones hopes and dreams in life. Let's take a look shall we:

Fuck hearthstone

Whoa! Chill out dude. You were so hyped about this game 2 weeks ago, and now you are angry because you missed out on an invite to a closed beta? Talk about entitled.

Fuck the people who brand us as "entitled", if Blizzard knew what the fuck they were doing, they'd make the beta open. 

I'm sorry to have to be the one to break it to you man, but you are acting pretty damn entitled. You expect to be in a closed beta, despite the fact that you are no more entitled to it than me.

Apparently being a long-time Blizzard veteran means nothing to them, however every single mediocre streamer and their grandma gets to play the game because marketing.

I've played every single Blizzard game since Warcraft 2. Does that mean that I am any more entitled to get into the beta than someone who has played every Blizzard game since Warcraft 3? Starcraft 2? Get off your high horse and deal with the fact that you aren't some special snowflake. And of course Blizzard is going to market the game. That's what it's all about.

In short, chill out guys. You'll get your chance to play this game. It's not going to kill you to wait till open release.

Video Game Classification in Australia

It's something every single gamer in Australia dreads. You are excited about a new game coming out in the near future, when you see somewhere that it has been denied classification by the ACRB. There have been some changes to our classification system recently, and also some controversy about those changes. However let's examine the history of video game classification in Australia.

Since an article published by Hyper in 1993, it became known that video games were not allowed the R18+ rating, meaning that any games that could not be rated MA15+ would be refused classification and not available for sale in Australia. During this time games that failed were able to edit their content to attempt to pass a second time. Wikipedia has a sizable list of games that were initially refused classification, along with the final result of that game.

It was at the beginning of 2013 that the R18+ rating finally took effect, twenty years after the original article by Hyper. Why did it take so long to implement? One of the major blocks came from the governments perception that video games were for children only. It comes as no surprise to those of us who are gamers that the average age for a gamer is around 30, and has been playing games for 10+ years. Despite this, many of those against the implementation of an R18+ rating for video games made their voice known with cries of "Think of the children!"

One of those people was Michael Atkinson the former Attorney-General of South Australia from 2003 to 2010. During his time, he blocked each and every attempt to have a R18+ rating introduced in Australia. How? To get the law passed, it required the agreement of each of the Attorney-Generals; there could be no opposition. By opposing it, Atkinson single-handedly stopped any progress on the R18+ rating. His reasons?

I don't support the introduction of an R18+ rating for electronic games, chiefly because it will greatly increase the risk of children and vulnerable adults being exposed to damaging images and messages.

Also in the same exclusive with Gamespot, Atkinson also mentions that his three sons play video games:

I have three sons who regularly play computer games at home--the eldest is now 22. I see my children become physically and emotionally obsessed with games, and it is difficult to drag them away from the gaming console. 

Because of his personal experiences with and single minded view of gaming, Atkinson continued to refuse to support the introduction of the R18+ rating. Finally, when Atkinson stepped down as Attorney-General, progress was made as John Rau was shown to be more reasonable and supportive of introducing the R18+ rating. The final vote was passed in 2012, with the finalised guidelines coming into effect on January 1st 2013.

It's been a rocky road for the R18+ rating in Australia, and with the recent controversy surrounding Saints Row IV, there may still be some ways to go before we get the R18+ rating we deserve, but for now we do have something at least. As a small aside, I would highly recommend that you read this 2010 article from Youth Studies Australia for very impartial, seemingly unbiased report on both sides of the debate.

But for now, and as always:

GAME ON!